December 29, 1996 10:10 PM Well, that was 4 days from hell. The power went off 5:21 Thursday morning, and we didn't get it back until 9:37 tonight. We had back to back ice storms, the 1st one was the worst I have ever seen here. Broke or destroyed most of our trees. Inch or more of ice on everything. Lost a freezer full of food. Of course, we couldn't get out. We have a wood stove, gas cooktop and water heater, so we weren't as bad off as a lot of people. No email will be lost, it is receiving the backed up mail at this moment. Throbnet and PRnet should also be OK. However, most of the incoming satellite mail will be lost for the time down. This includes Ilink, Intelec, Rime & UNinet, and newsgroups. Holonet newsgroups are OK. December 18, 1996 2:00 PM Looks like I haven't written anything in here for a while. Not too much new going on. I am working on making my own up to date list of other BBS's in Portland. I started this in July, and a number of other boards have gone away since then. After New Year, it is back to work again on getting WC5 up and running. It is now called WinServer, and there have been a lot of changes made to it recently. In case I forget between now and then, hope everyone has a good Christmas and a Happy New Year. December 9, 1996 2:15 PM A new file area #161 has been made for all the train and plane pictures. Another area #46 has been made for all the old Dos games (pre-95). December 2, 1996 3:00 PM Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving! If anyone is having problems on Node 1, try calling in one of the other lines. 695-3260 or 61. Node 1 seems to be causing a lot of trouble. Sorry! November 16, 1996 8:30 PM Node 3 is working again. Its' boot floppy went south several days ago, and the fix floppy was not exactly right. It is now! November 4, 1996 7:30PM Well, I think the dropped carrier problem is fixed, the phone co worked on it most of the day. I also had a corrupt system file which was causing lockups on Node 1. That is also now fixed. November 2, 1996 6:00PM We appear to be having a dropped carrier problem again! Of course it is on the weekend, when I can't call the phone co, which I will do first thing Monday. Sorry! October 31, 1996 10:20 AM Where is everyone? Seems like there are fewer and fewer users! 3 new CDs have been mounted. One is the shareware update to File Area 71, one is the Gutenberg files (this takes most of them off the hard disk) File Area 78, and lastly another Adult CD, Celebrity Nudes File Area 79. There are over 10,000 files on this one. Only the Shareware is going on as New Files. Another reminder re mail pickups: all mail runs for the small nets are done between 11AM & 12 noon. October 21, 1996 4:45PM Finally got around to making file groups, I have been putting this off for a really long time, as it was a major undertaking. There are some pros and cons and gotchas with this. October 18, 1996 3:30 PM Sorry bout that, folks. The power went out at about 10:15, and just now got restored. Apparently a tree came down on the main feed to Corbett! October 15, 1996 1:00 PM Another new file area #34 for all the Web and HTML stuff, which had been sort of scattered through several file areas. October 14, 1996 3:45 PM More net changes. U'NiNet changed its packet delivery from one hub to another, which meant I had to do a bunch of changes here to match the new Control.dat. GRRR! RIME made some changes too. Following is the text of a message regarding conference changes. ---------------------------------------- From : JOSEPH SHEPPARD To : ALL Subj : Conferences Closed/Merged Numb : 195 of 310 Date : 09/22/96 6:12pm Read : [N/A] Reference : None Conf : 1996 - UI_UNINET Private : YES The following Conferences are being either closed or merged with other topics due to low message traffic. U'NI-net Sysops, PLEASE remove these conferences from your systems immediately! Conference Name Merged With 14 WORLDMARKET.......Buy-Sell 21 Desqview..........Closed 33 SLMR-OLX..........Offline 36 Wildcat!..........Telecom 52 AutoRacing........Sports 54 Cars..............Sports 55 Brain-Teasers.....ChitChat 59 Qmodem............Telecom 67 Word_Proc.........Closed 73 DTP...............Closed 86 Agnostic..........Religion 88 QDECK-SUITE.......Closed 93 HSLINK............Telecom 99 Muscle-Cars.......Sports 100 History...........ChitChat 102 Jobs..............ChitChat 111 Pascal............Programming 112 TeenClub..........ChitChat 113 WWEvents..........ChitChat 126 Telix.............Telecom 127 Public-Safety.....ChitChat 132 Desqview-X........Closed --- þ OLXWin 1.00b þ U'NI-net Host sysop@ledge.com --- þ OLXWin 1.00b þ U'NI-net Host sysop@ledge.com þ QNet3á þ U'NI-net Host: The Ledge/Lakeview Terrace, CA þ (818) 896-4015 September 29, 1996, 10:00 AM The following newsgroups have been added, * ones are interactive in Holonet. alt.security.mace #418 alt.security.cointel #419 alt.security.terrorism #420 alt.security.sigint #421 alt.security.tcsm #422 alt.security.pps #423 alt.security.espionage #424 alt.rv #411 *alt.energy.homepower #382 *rec.outdoors.rv-travel #412 rec.radio.info #335 soc.culture.alaska #119 sci.electronics.repair #181 alt.culture.alaska #118 alt.music.world # 58 alt.politics.org.nsa #144 *alt.radio.scanner #336 rec.radio.scanner #337 September 28, 1996 11:15 PM The problem causing Node 1 to lock up has now been solved (I think). I had to keep renaming it which was getting annoying, it is now back to being Node 1. It is now 2 years since I bought this from Janice. Time sure flies when you are having fun! September 28, 1996 11:30 AM There are several new IgaNet conferences including a feed from UseNet mailing list ROOTS_L, Conf. #967. September 27, 1996 1:10 PM I have just added the latest Mac disk with 4000 new files, File Area # 75, Mac users take note. I am not putting them in as new files, as PC users surely don't want to have 4000 Mac files in their download packet. September 22, 1996 7:00 PM The latest new modem is now on Line 1 (Node 12). It is a new 33 Zoom. Also. I have split up the Chess area into 2. The old # 42 will now have ONLY the played games. The new # 39 will have chess programs, gifs, book reviews and everything else other than the played games. September 18, 1996 2:35 PM Line 1 is temporarily on Node 5 on a 14,4 modem. It kept locking up. So until we get the new modem, that line is back on a reliable old one. Lines 2 & 3 have 28.8 modems. September 15, 1996. 10:50 AM If anyone is having trouble with Line 1 (3250) try 3260 or 3261 instead. The new Motorola modem on 1 is not behaving well, and we are going to replace it shortly with another ZOOM. We are waiting for a new shipment to come in of the new faster modems. The ZOOMs on 2 & 3 are working just fine. September 3, 1996 10:40 AM The line noise filters are installed, also line chokes. Things seem to be running better now, much fewer drop carriers. Hope it continues! August 26, 1996 12:30 PM The phone tech has been out, checked out my lines (which are all clean and checked various things with trunk lines and with the Gresham office. They had a trunk line go down Saturday. which probably started the whole problem, but it should not still be persisting. They are going to think about it now, as they have checked everything possible. August 25, 1996 10:30 AM Line noise still persisting. I have put Line 1 (3250) on Node 7, on one of the old modems, but that doesn't seem to be helping either. We are ordering some line noise attenuators, and will be TALKING TO THE PHONE COMPANY EARLY TOMORROW! Any comments on the new menus? By the way, new RIP menus are also in place, and working properly now. Anyone with RIP capability might try them, they look nice. August 24. 1996 6PM Major problems today with dropped carriers. Tweaked and re-tweaked the modems extensively to no avail. If it persists, we will talk to the phone co. and/or Mustang on Monday. Hopefully, it will go away by then. My apologies, and thanks to all for your patience, especially to the person who had to make REPEATED tries before he finally got all 7 files of Quake downloaded! August 14, midnight Finally got the other new modems up and running. All lines are now on 28,800. If anyone has any problems with them. let me know. August 9, 1996 3:45PM Some complaints about there being no network mail for several days. Nothing came down from the satellite for most of the small networks. I suspect they have occasional scheduling problems as everything comes through eventually. As I suspected the errant packets all came through today; 3 Iganet pkts., 4 Ilink, 2 Intelec, 3 Rime and 1 Uninet. Thobnet and PrNet come in on land line. RIME has changed management, Bonnie Anthony and Howard Belasco are out of it. This also caused a hub change, and I am still having some problems getting set up with the new hub. July 28, 1996 10:15 PM Finally got another hard drive mounted, so I have room again for more files (for a while). 1000+ new files a month eats up space in a hurry. Now I can finish this months' batch of the RAR music files (72 mg worth). I also have several hundred new Adult files that will be going on soon, as well as 60 mg of shareware I have collected from various sources that is sitting on my personal computer. I am working on making a current list of BBS's, as the lists I have on the board are outdated. In the process of calling other boards, I am finding very few that are the equal of Rain in the areas of files and networks. July 20, 1996 3:30 PM Ilink is working now. The Throbnet hub is apparently still having problems, no new packets since his hard drive went down. I have left him a message on his board. July 19, 1996 12:45 PM Note to visiting Sysops who would like to place ads. There are now two places to put them, Message area #805, where you can upload prepared copy, or in the Sunrise ads, which is suitable for short ads. July 17, 1996 6:30 PM Done finally, not one of lifes' more fun experiences. It took all day Saturday to move the satellite, about half of it futzing around with a cable that turned out to only work one way, not the other. Sunday, moved the board. Doing it in that heat was a bitch. Anyway, it got back up and working by Sunday evening, no phone lines until today. In defense of our local Cascade Utilities phone co., they did their best. They had to install new cable down an adjacent road before they could even supply any more lines to us. The Gorge Commission took its' time about issuing the permit. They had an emergency where I line got cut down by Stark St. Bridge, cutting off all lines to Corbett. And they had several other conflicting major jobs. But as of 6PM we had lines again, albeit only 3. That is all the additional lines available to us right now on our existing service. When things get busy again, we can always use one of our house lines as a backup. Sorry to be down so long, I appreciate your patience. July 16, 1996 5:00 PM There is a weird problem with Ilink. It is not seeing the messages to download into the QWK packet. It works for me, but does not work for any other user profile. I now have a Wildcat tech working on it. He tried it out himself, found I was right (I think he thought I had missed something simple), and will get back to me. In the meantime, the messages are there, waiting until I can get it fixed. July 13. 1996 6:30 PM Still have not gotten replacement RIME files from Belasco. There is apparently a glitch in the Ilink setup, so that messages are not being available for download. I will fix it as soon as the board is moved. We moved the satellite dish today, (not fun in this heat) but have not yet gotten it locked back on to the bird. The board goes tomorrow, prob. be late Monday before it is back up. July 12, 1996 11:30 PM Ilink is finally up and running (mostly). I had about 2 weeks worth of packets backed up to process, 16.000+ messages. This looks like a pretty lively network. July 11, 1996 12:30 PM My hub for Throbnet lost his hard disk, so it will be a couple of days before I can pick up mail there again. He says we will not lose any mail. July 10, 1996 1 PM Network problems today: Throbnet is absolutely refusing to make connection, so will try it again tomorrow. IgaNet had a weeks worth of mail backed up due to a password change, now fixed. Ilink is still waiting on the password info to unlock the satellite files RIME had 4 days worth of packets that did not go to the satellite at all, I downloaded them via (expensive) land line, but now they refuse to run. Message to Belasco! UniNet and Intelec tend to run sporadically, files some days, not others. Phone company assures me !! that they can get the lines done this week. I hope they are right, as I would like to get this move over with! July 3, 1996, 10:30 AM Ilink is a go, RAIN has been approved. However, I still need to get more setup info from the hub, which is temporarily offline. Should have it up and running by next week. The move has been postponed another week. Phone company had to order cable, get permits etc.. June 29, 1996 1PM Still waiting to hear back on Ilink, can't finish setting it up until I get their OK, a Control.dat and a password. I have added two new CDs. AMUG (#75) has about 6000 MAC files, if you have MAC friends, pass the word along. BBS Stuff (#77) is mostly stuff of interest to other Sysops, some of it is not very new, but might be useful. Also still waiting for word from the phone company on our phone lines so we can move! June 21, 1996, 12 Noon Wildcat v4.20 has now been installed and seems to be working fine. June 9, 1996, 12:30 PM Am considering adding Ilink. Ilink is apparently pretty picky about who is allowed to carry it. The co-ordinator checked out RAIN, liked what he saw and extended an invitation. Feedback appreciated. May 30, 1996, 8:45 AM Some files have duplicates on the Shareware Disk (File Area #71) and on the hard disks. In the interests of conserving disk space, any dupes on the hard disks are being removed. So if you can't find a game or whatever on the regular hard disk categories, try looking in #71. May 29, 1996, 12:15 PM Due to flagrant misuse (flaming etc.) of the system, some changes have have made to the Demo user profile. Demo users will still have 20 minutes. However, after 30 days it will revert to a 15 minute profile with no further access to Internet Email or games. May 24, 1996, 10:15 AM Sorry about that, folks. One of the mail events crashed last night, and somehow screwed up the entire system, knocking every node down. I am hoping in the near future, hopefully July, to be able to move RAIN to my home, where I can keep a better eye on it. This depends on the phone company providing the necessary equipment to do this. On a cheerier note, I finally finished cleaning up the old file areas #s 7 & 8. There are no longer any files in them, all having been either deleted or moved to an appropriate area. The numbers themselves will shortly be deleted also. May 17, 1996 1:30 PM A new feature has been added, Classified Ads (part of the Sunrise Doors series). Try it out, let me know how you like it. This is only for paying subscribers, and will not appear on the Demo menu. May 7, 1996 11:00AM I am in the process of cleaning up the last of the old files in File Areas 7 & 8. Deleting some, and moving the rest into their appropriate file areas. This will make it much easier to find everything that one wants to find. Also, some of the older RAR files are being moved to an offline disk, so as to free up more room for new incoming files. We are starting to do some serious work toward getting RAIN on the Internet, now that Wildcat 5 is available to help enable this. It will still require a considerable outlay for new equipment, phone lines etc.. More subscriptions would surely help in the meantime. Very tentative ETA is end of summer. May 3, 1996 11:00 AM Sorry about that. Node 7 crashed about 4 AM (while running an event) in such a fashion that every other node then crashed as soon as they tried to do anything. I didn't know about it until I got in here at 10:30. If you call in, and don't get an answer THERE IS SOMETHING WRONG! You can call me at home, so I can go fix it. April 29, 1996 9:15 AM Sorry about being down yesterday! I was adding files, and somehow managed to crash all three servers, and screw up the file database in the process. I neglected to make a backup 1st, and the 2 day old backup was missing several hundred files that went in, in those 2 days. Really, really sorry. No messages were lost. It took from about 3PM until 6:30 AM. I guess I just should have re-entered the files instead, which would have been a pain in the butt for me. I think the problem was caused by a bad file on the CDRom, which has happened before. Some RIME files were lost due to the satellite sending them to the wrong file directory, no connection with the above problem. Some of them showed up again in the right directory just as I was leaving here (1PM), and are now processing. April 24, 1996 1:30 PM No Throbnet or PRnet messages were processed today for 2 reasons: 1. Could not get through to Throbnet hub, probably due to fire at US West screwing up phone service. 2. By the time I discovered this, Pack was running. I process both PRnet and Throbnet at the same time, and they cannot process while Pack is running, and it cannot be broken into without major problems. Today's messages should process OK tomorrow. April 19, 1996 9:00 PM Two new file areas are being added, # 20 for icons and WAV files, and # 21 for fonts. # 20 is done, 21 should be done in the next 2 or 3 days. April 15, 1996 1:30 PM I had a request to add Ilink, which I will postpone for now. If 5 new people would sign on for Ilink, then I would add it immediately! I have restored or added the following nets since I took over RAIN: RIME several hundred new newsgroups Paul Revere Net IgaNet Int. Genealogical Soc. ThrobNet Intelec U'Ninet I have probably gained 1 or 2 new subscribers per net, and am right now averaging about 10 subscriptions per month. It takes 3 times that to pay the bills. I have looked at other boards, RAIN has more conferences and more files (both better organized) than most boards. The only thing RAIN doesn't have is Fido (which I am not going to tackle now) and full Internet access. I now have the full release version of Wildcat 5 (Annihilator) and Win95, which runs it. I will be running this at home to see what is needed to get it running at RAIN to facilitate the full Internet access, while not changing features that oldime users are used to. April 5, 1996 2:15 PM ThrobNet now appears to be up and running. April 3, 1996 1:15 PM ThrobNet dispute appears to have been resolved, now it is just a matter of getting the file transfers enabled. Everything is ready to go on this end. OS/2 files are now all re-arranged, still working on Amiga, which is not a priority item. March 31, 1996 12:30 PM Just discovered a glitch in the new file area 80. It is now fixed so that it recognizes the files that were there. March 29, 1996 2:15 PM In case anyone is wondering why no new files for the last couple of days, I finished the month's satellite batch early and won't start the new batch until after the 1st. So have been cleaning up and re-organizing file areas instead. The Amiga and OS/2 file areas will be further divided instead of all lumped together as they are now. If anyone is looking for Throbnet, hang in there. I am having a dispute with the co-ordinator. If it is not resolved satisfactorily, I will post the full content of the messages here. The other nets are all running fine automatically now, no apparent problems. You noticed I said "apparent". I am sure someone will let me know if there are any problems. March 19, 1996 11:05AM In response to several comments, the Demo user time has been increased from 15 to 20 minutes. March 17, 1996 2:45PM The added conferences for Planet Connect are now in place, these include 10 trading card #s 458-467, 4 Visual Basic #s 517-520, 4 misc. ones #s 142, 239, 268 and 751, also 9 new Adult ones #s 822, 823, 826, 832, 833 836, 842, 858 and 861. Still working on the new network. March 16, 1996 3:15 PM Sorry to be down a little longer today. Had a request for some more conferences, which have to be done with the system down. Also laying the conferences in place for a new Adult network. March 12, 1996 12:15 PM I just realized that I hadn't written anything here for a while. I am still here! The system has been running pretty well, finally. No user crashes that I know of for a long time. The networks are all behaving, except that I still don't have the outgoing scripts automated properly, so outgoing is still run manually. Please, if you like RAIN, tell your friends! I NEED MORE SUBSCRIBERS. I want to add full Internet access, but cannot afford to, when I am not even breaking even now. February 29, 1996 10:00 AM Well, RIME came through after all. 30+ packets in their directory this morning, a few of which were duplicates. 25 total new ones dating back to 2/18. So it doesn't look like anything will be missed. They are going into the system right now. About half tossed this morning, the rest will go in later today, or tomorrow. PRNET seems to be working fine now, just have to automate it. February 28, 1996 10:30 AM Net updates: INTELEC: No packets since 2/20, Planet Connect doesn't know why, will check with them again tomorrow. John Young says packets not uploading to PC correctly. 5 packets landline downloaded and processed today. UNINET: Packet from satellite received and processed today, dated 2/26. Left another message with the hub regarding the outgoing mail problem. RIME: No packets since 2/22, Planet Connect says Howard Belasco tells them that the move is finished. and packets will start feeding again tonight. No indication as to whether back packets will be made up, though I would think they would. PRNET: Waiting on hub to setup polling. Checked again PM, packet available, but only for 2 of the conferences. Left message about the other ones. IGANET: Two packets received and processed today. February 26, 1996 1:15PM Net problems and progress: RIME: Planet Connect told me today, that as far as they knew Howard Belasco intended to continue sending to satellite after all. He and Bonnie are apparently in the middle of moving equipment around, that may explain why there have been no RIME files since the 22nd. I hope he is right, as it is going to be a major pain in the rear to change over to a land line feed for RIME, not to mention the expense. INTELEC: Working fine, still exporting manually. UNINET: Incoming working fine, problem with outgoing due to packet naming problem at host's end. Waiting for fix from host, 2 outbound packets sitting here on hold. PRNET: Finally got new Node #, should finish setting up tomorrow or Wednesday. No problems with any other feeds that I am aware of. RAIN now has a home page, unfortunately situated on CompuServe, until I can get full Internet access implemented here. The URL is: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/mariel/rain.htm Apparently one of the nodes lost its' time, and screwed up many of the game scores. The problem is fixed, but many of the February scores are lost. February 23, 1996 1:15 PM To anyone noticing a lack of messages today, something went sour in the satellite dish last night about 9PM, so nothing has come in since. We are working on it now. 1:30 PM Fixed! Data coming in again. Small nets will duplicate and not lose much, if any. February 20, 1996 1 PM U'Nin-et/Ledge answers: U'Nin-et packets are sporadic, today 2 came in, then sometimes it will go several days without any. I have finally gotten the preliminary OK on hub connection, and the first outgoing packets went out today. I have a lead on a network called Paul Revere Net, dealing with 2nd Amendment issues. I need some feedback on how many people would be interested in this. February 19, 1996 12:20 PM The satellite node thoughtfully crashed last night about 11:30, and of course, I had no way of knowing until I come in, in the morning. Fortunately, most stuff is sent more than once, except for newsgroups. Intelec, Uninet & IgaNet all came in after I rebooted and were processed. February 16, 1996 11:30 AM To answer some questions that have been, or will be asked. 1. The system was totally down this morning, not a power failure, but every node had dumped out of Wildcat, so none of the mail events ran last night. They are playing catchup right now. 2. Uninet & Intelec are sporadic, some days a packet comes in, some days not. The satellite is OK, so the problem is on their end. 3. I was having a swap problem, causing some of the events not to run right, so I was running them manually in the morning, usually after many pick up their mail. RIME & Intelec are running right now. I solved the problem, something really stupid I did, caused it. 4. Howard Belasco (Bonnie's brother) has taken over the management of RIME. As always, there are problems in turnovers. However, I am still getting 2 to 5 mail packets a day. Howard wants to take RIME off the satellite, which I have protested very sharply. I would appreciate feedback to him regarding this, use RIME #1104. February 13, 1996, 12:30 PM We are experiencing intermittant memory problems, causing errors in swapping out to doors. If anyone can't access a game or mail door, that is why. Hope to have it fixed soon. Was down a little longer than usual this morning, making some new file areas and renumbering 2 conferences that were at their limit. This cannot be done with the system running, unfortunately. February 10, 1996 12:45PM For some unknown reason, the satellite feed shut itself off last night, so we lost a lot of mail. If anyone is missing a response from someone, (not Holonet), that is why. It ran fine as soon as I rebooted the node! February 8, 1996 11:00AM Hope everyone out there is out of flood range. Of course, we are up here, but have limited access to town, due to road closures. Scenic and Corbett Hill are both closed now. We had no water during the freeze, due to a broken water main, and of course were iced in for several days. The water company just told me that all of Corbett may be out of water shortly! I just worked over the Holonet conferences again, some were not set up right. They should be all working OK now. At least the board has been running fairly well, the power supply has been doing its' job. February 7, 1996 1:15 PM In case anyone may have missed it, the following newsgroups are interactive on Holonet. Some have been for a while, some I just changed over. These are in addition to the PDX conferences. Feedback time, would it be helpful if I changed the names of the newsgroup conferences to that of the actual newsgroup, i.e. Cats would become rec.pets.cats?????? # 31 Folk Dancing #219 Aviation #229 Firearms Info #238 Golf #242 War Games #323 Home Brew #324 Cats #366 Woodworking #408 Travel in Europe #806 NW Personals February 5, 1996 5:00 PM Out again for 2 days, unable to get to the board. Sorry for any problems this may have caused anyone. I crashed Node 5 uploading from home, so no newsgroups ran for 2 days. They should run tonight OK. No mail is lost, just delayed. January 30, 1996 3:00 PM Several new things: The 3 Walnut Creek CDs (#72-Internet Info, #73-Space Pics & #74-Tech. Library) have been taken offline. The files are still available, and in the database, people will just have to leave a request for them. These CD's don't get much use, and it will free up space for new offerings, which will include 2 new Adult discs, and a disk full of Doom cheats. The file areas for Amiga, Mac, OS/2 and Unix are being moved up 100, i.e #22 is now #122 and so on. This will avoid annoying the predominate DOS users with screens full of new Amiga files, when they do a new files list on all of the file areas. It also frees up these areas nearer the beginning. Hope that makes sense. January 28, 1996 1:15 PM I just discovered 2 newsgroups that were not working due to minor typos. #387 Internet Info for news.newusers.questions and #818 misc.forsale.non-computer. They are working now, and receiving messages. January 28, 1996 10:45 AM Weather got me again! Snowed in all day yesterday. Everything here at the board ran fine except for the satellite feed. This inexplicably quit early Saturday morning, and I couldn't get out to fix it. If anyone thinks they might have missed an incoming message on any of the small nets, ask the sender to retransmit. Internet Email on Holonet is not affected. Some packets are transmitted more than once, so hopefully, not too much was lost. Everything else ran fine. January 23, 1996, 2:45 PM Uninet is now setup as far as the conferences go, and the import seems to be running smoothly. I still need to get set up as a node for the export. January 22, 1996 2:30 PM A question from a new user caused me to learn something useful, which others might be interested in. Put * in front of your login name, and it will take you straight to the main menu, or use ! to go to WCMail. There are several new newsgroups, 3 for board games (in Games)and 3 for travel (in Misc. conferences). A newsgroup has been found to feed Barbershop Singing. The weather maps are back. See 3 new files in the Weather area, these are now Gifs instead of Pcx's. Planet.zip contains all sorts of new and interesting information, updated several times a day. This is a beta version at this time, but looks OK. These files are updated approximately every 2 hours by the satellite, as my update routine does not run that often, the file will usually be newer than their stamp. January 21, 1996 2:15 PM I have just added 50 new GIFs of photos from around the world from the Capstone Collection. You are asked by them to read the License.txt file. January 19, 1996 2:40 PM A new conference for singles personal ads has been added, #806. Also, a reminder that I will change up to 3 newsgroup conferences per user to Holonet, so that they can be interactive. January 18, 1996 11:30 AM I have just implemented a nifty new feature in Wildcat, that being conference groupings. No doubt some will be unhappy that there is an extra step in the Join Listing, but I think most people will find this very useful, especially with the ever increasing number of conferences. I see it has started snowing outside! So I am heading for home early, while I can still get there, and hope the system stays up through this next storm. January 17, 1996 1:15 PM Wildcat v4.12 appears to be up and running just fine. The monitor problem was indeed just a fuse, $1.99 for a package of 4 solved that. I wish everything was that easy to fix. January 15, 1996 1:30 PM Wildcat install now postponed til Wednesday. Another power surge fried one of the monitors, hopefully it is only a fuse. The main server did not recover properly from the surge, which apparently the UPS didn't catch, AGAIN! Without the monitor, I coudn't see why. I had to go home, and borrow another monitor in order to get running again. January 11, 1996 11:00AM Next Monday morning, RAIN will be down a little longer than usual, as I will be installing Wildcat v4.12. January 8, 1996 4:00PM Looks like I have finally gotten the outgoing Intelec setup working, I spent all afternoon tweaking this and that. There was one outgoing message, which has gone out successfully. It is still not automated, but at least it is working. The CDrom server seems to be behaving now, finally. I did 2 updates on it, there have been a lot of downloads, and no crashes yet, since the last fix! January 2, 1996 2:30 PM As of 12/30, the Intelec network is in the hands of a new administrator, John Young, and will be based in California, not New York. I sent my app in to Cliff Watkins on 12/18 with a CC #, and I suspect it has gotten lost in the transition. Also, they are now not taking Credit cards, so I will probably have to send in a new app with a check. I finally thought to read the Net_admin conference, where all this info was located. Anyway, this explains why the outgoing Intelec is not yet implemented. Note to disgruntled Blue Lake & NWCS users: I am either already offering or plan to offer many of the same networks and services, and am open to requests. It sometimes takes a while to get things going, as this is a one- woman (limited) operation. But they do get there eventually. January 1, 1996 1PM Happy New Year, everyone. Sorry to have to be down a little longer today for backup, there is more that has to be done at the end of the year.